


Thanks for the Memory

by Slenderlock



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M, Steve is a little selfish, Together they sort of fit, Wanda tries to make things right, not Steve/Wanda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-18
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-03-31 02:00:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3960214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slenderlock/pseuds/Slenderlock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I won’t look if you don’t want me to,” she says, shaking her head. “But I can show you-”</p>
<p>“A vision,” he says, smiling hollowly. “Like you did before.”</p>
<p>“Not like before,” she insists. “Not based on your fear, but on… better things.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Thanks for the Memory

**Author's Note:**

> Title from this song:  
>  __  
> [Thanks for the memory- of rainy afternoons, swingy Harlem tunes, and motor trips and burning lips and burning toast and prunes- how lovely it was](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4d7qDSAMB-s)  
> 

It’s really very easy to sneak up on Captain America if you know how to do it.

And, also, if you’ve got supernatural powers. That helps quite a lot.

Clint does it sometimes, if only because he’s shaped most of his career around being able to sneak up on people. Natasha can, of course, because she’s Natasha. And every once in a while, if Steve is particularly distracted, Bruce can manage to be quiet enough not to catch his attention until he’s a foot away.

And right now, the two of them are off on an away mission, taking care of some old loose ends they’d never bothered to tie up.

_“Oh_ my god.”

So when he’s carrying coffee down from the kitchen (Stark’s kitchen, to be precise) and turns around a corner, he’s not expecting to see someone standing there waiting to shock him into dropping his coffee mug and letting it shatter on the floor.

But of course, that’s exactly what happens.

She bends down and at once the scattered remains of the mug begin to levitate off the carpet, faintly glowing.

“Sorry,” he says, standing there awkwardly watching as Wanda cleans up his mess.

“I am sorry,” she corrects, shaking her head. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“I’m not usually startled,” Steve counters, shrugging. He looks over his shoulder at the kitchen, decides he doesn’t really need coffee, and starts to continue on to the ‘living room’- the set of couches positioned around one of Stark’s biggest TVs, that is. Wanda follows him.

“Can I help you?” he asks.

“I meant to speak with you,” Wanda doesn’t meet his eyes. “As I spoke with the others before.”

And yeah, Steve remembers Tony mentioning something about Scarlet Witch- if that’s the name she’s going by now- talking to him, maybe a week ago?

“Go on,” he says, shrugging. He makes it to the couch and slouches in one of the corners. It’s too early to sit up properly. Wanda takes a seat on the other side of the couch, looking at her hands.

“Before my brother and I learned of Ultron’s true intentions,” she begins, and Steve makes a mental note to himself that she’s much, much stronger than she looks if she’s able to speak about her brother that calmly, “we attacked you.”

“Hey,” he says, quietly. “It’s all right, all right? I understand.”

“I wanted to apologize,” Wanda presses on, ignoring him. “For- for showing you what I did.”

He remembers, then. Peggy, the invitation to dance. The music swelling, the room vacant and cold, and a dark, almost shapeless silhouette against the light, with no name and no words.

“No one here blames you for what you’ve done,” he says, shaking his head. “And we’re all fine now, see?”

“You are not fine.” Wanda shakes her head. At his puzzled look, she continues. “I can feel it. See it.” She shrugs. “Without looking. I can feel you- you are troubled. You are unlike the others.”

“The others?”

“Stark’s vision was his motivation, the reason he built Ultron,” she explains. “Widow’s was her past. Banner, his anger.” She shrugs. “All of them healed, but you did not.”

“I’m fine.” He shakes his head.

“I want to help.” Wanda reaches for his hand. He doesn’t pull it away. “I can show you- give you a happier vision.”

“Wanda,” he says, not sure if he should be shaking his head. “You don’t have to do this.”                            

“I want to.” She frowns. “I feel- it is similar to how I feel without my brother,” she explains. “I understand. I want to help.” When Steve doesn’t say anything, she lets go of his hand. “But I understand if you do not trust me.”

“Wanda-”

“Just let me help,” Wanda pleads, and for a moment it almost looks like she’s about to take his hand, but she doesn’t. Steve is grateful- he’s not really one for physical contact. Or at least he isn’t, now.

He sighs.

He does trust her; he knows enough to know that she’s genuine. He’s always the first to offer the olive branch, to give people second chances. Because more often than not, people deserve them. And Wanda is no exception. But this? Somehow, the invasion of his mind is more than a little unsettling.

“I won’t look if you don’t want me to,” she says, shaking her head. “But I can show you-”

“A vision,” he says, smiling hollowly. “Like you did before.”

“Not like before,” she insists. “Not based on your fear, but on… better things.”

“I’m not sure-”

“Please.”

She does take his hand, then, and it’s not so bad. He can’t bring himself to actually say it, so he just nods, eyes on her hand in his. She lets out a breath, and he can feel rather than see the energy- magic?- radiating from her palms. It swirls around his hands, up his arms, shoulders, until finally-

-

_“The war’s over, Stevie.”_

_He doesn’t have to turn to know exactly whose voice that is, but he turns all the same. And standing there, holding out a hand, is Bucky. He’s not the same Bucky from back then; his hair’s too long and his eyes are a little bit too sad. But he’s not quite the Winter Soldier, either; he’s got both his arms and half the bulk._

_Steve doesn’t trust himself to speak just yet, so he takes Bucky’s hand and allows himself to be pulled into the waltz._

_The room’s half full of people, all dolled up and celebrating, and the band’s playing a slow waltz that’s somehow still as full of joy as the upbeat horns and drum solos. Bucky pulls him to the center of the room and twirls him around and around and takes him into his arms, and Steve can’t help it, he really can’t, he starts laughing along with the room, laughing as he dances with Bucky around the room, through the music and the people and the joy._

_“Whatever happened to two left feet, huh?” And Bucky’s voice is so similar, so close to what he remembers- but almost doesn’t cut it._

_“I got a little practice,” he says, tugging Bucky down into a dip, and bringing him back up again._

_“I can tell.” Bucky slips an arm around his waist, pulls him closer. Steve mimics him, so they’re rocking together to the waltz, barely moving at all across the floor._

_And part of him is still in that room, so he knows he’s got nothing to worry about, not here. Everyone else can look all they want, but no one can touch them. Not here._

_“I must be the luckiest dame in the world,” Bucky hums, lacing their fingers together, tucking his head in Steve’s neck. “To get to dance with someone like you.”_

_“Yeah?” Steve laughs, rocking him from side to side. “Does that mean I’m your best girl?”_

_“Guess it does, punk.”_

_“Jerk.”_

_And they’re back to the beginning._

_The rest of the room seems to leave them, then, and they sway together under the music. It’s not a hollow empty, not like before. It doesn’t leave him hollow, it’s more of a comfortable empty. An empty that they can fill together._

_“You know, Stevie,” Bucky says, quietly. The hand on Steve’s waist leaves, and resets itself in his hair. “I missed you.”_

_“Missed you too, Buck.” He smiles into Bucky’s neck, savoring the mixture of old Bucky’s and the Winter Soldier’s smells- half sweat and grime, half home. “More than you’d ever believe.”_

_“Yeah?” Bucky laughs, squeezing him tight._

_“Yeah.” Steve tries to laugh back, but it breaks somewhere halfway up his throat and turns a little into a sob._

_“Come on, Stevie, none of that.” Bucky pulls back a little, hand sliding to the back of Steve’s neck. “You know I can’t stand seeing you like that.” He leans forward, presses a kiss to Steve’s nose. He can’t really stop himself, then, from crying a little bit._

_“Buck, I,” he says, shaking his head._

_But this Bucky doesn’t seem to want him to talk, because he fits his lips over Steve’s, gently, perfectly. As Steve slides his eyes shut, the music dies down a little, not enough so they can’t hear it. Their fingers are still twined together, and Bucky’s thumb rubs lazily over his palm as they kiss alone to the music, dancing all the while._

_This isn’t based on memory, he knows logically. There’s nothing to base this off besides maybe the few kisses he’d gotten from chorus girls, and that one time with Natasha when they were on the run. But this isn’t just a dream, it’s fueled by more than just memories._

_He makes a mental note to thank Wanda later._

_Bucky finishes the kiss with one last peck to his lips, and looks him fondly in the eye. “Hey, Rogers, get your head out of the clouds.”_

_“Sorry,” he says, laughing. “Where were we?”_

_“Right about here, I think.”_

_One last tug of his hair and Bucky’s closed the distance between them again, and this time the music swells to meet them-_

_-_

“- okay?”

Steve thumbs over his eyes, but they’re filling with tears faster than he can dry them. There’s a hand over his arm again.

“I am sorry, I did not mean to-”

“It’s fine.”

As he’d expected, his voice is dry and cracked. He licks his lips and can almost feel the press of Bucky’s to his own. Rubs his eyes again.

“But you are crying-”

“I’m fine.” He finds that smiling is not difficult, not now. The memory- the dream- may not have been real, but that doesn’t mean he’s not allowed to enjoy thinking about it.

“It was beautiful,” Wanda says quietly, taking her hand back. Her magic is dormant, her hands are cold.

“Yeah,” he says, and almost wants to add in _he was_ for dramatic effect.

“If- if you wanted,” Wanda says, standing and twisting her hands together. “If you wished to do it again, it would be the least I could do.”

He considers it. Considers trying to fool himself again into thinking that any of that could be real. It would be selfish, he knows. It was selfish to do it in the first place. It’s selfish to keep the memory of the dream even now.

He shakes his head.

“Thank you,” he says, earnestly, “for this. Really, I. Thank you.”

Wanda nods in understanding, and turns to leave.

“You don’t need to apologize for anything, you know,” Steve calls after her. He gets no response.

Any minute now, his phone is going to buzz. There’s always trouble somewhere, no matter how many times he fights. But he’ll always be there. For now, though. For now, he sits on the couch, closes his eyes, and replays the memory a thousand times in his mind’s eye.

Maybe it’s selfish to keep the memory. But then again, Steve Rogers has never been perfect.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I saw a post going around that maybe Wanda would feel so guilty over the mess she blames herself for in Ultron that she sets about trying to make things right, by giving people (i.e. Steve) happier visions. So then this came out.
> 
> Feel free to send me a note or check me out on my [tumblr!](http://www.slenderlock.tumblr.com)


End file.
